Abstract
In this work we describe a soft and ultrastretchable fiber with a magnetic liquid metal (MLM) core for electrical switches used in remote magnetic actuation. MLM was prepared by removing the oxide layer on the liquid metal and subsequent mixing with magnetic iron particles. We used SEBS (poly[styrene-b-(ethylene-co-butylene)-b-styrene]) and silicone to prepare stretchable elastic fibers. Once hollow elastic fibers form, MLM was injected into the core of the fiber at ambient pressure. The fibers are soft (Young’s modulus of 1.6~4.4 MPa) and ultrastretchable (elongation at break of 600~5000%) while maintaining electrical conductivity and magnetic property due to the fluidic nature of the core. Magnetic strength of the fibers was characterized by measuring the maximum effective distance between the magnet and the fiber as a function of iron particle concentration in the MLM core and the polymeric shell. The MLM core facilitates the use of the fiber in electrical switches for remote magnetic actuation. This ultrastretchable and elastic fiber with MLM core can be used in soft robotics, and wearable and conformal electronics.
Highlights
Stretchable electronics have attracted enormous attention in the past decade due to their potential for application in soft robotics [1,2,3,4], bioelectronics [5,6,7], wearable [8,9,10] and conformal electronics [11,12,13,14]
Gallium spontaneously forms a native oxide layer on its surface, and it can be in the absence of oxide skin by galvanic replacement generated due to the standard repatterned into desired geometries on the substrates by various approaches
The fiber is stretchable while maintaining electrical conductivity due to the fluidic of nature the magnetic liquid metal (MLM) core
Summary
Stretchable electronics have attracted enormous attention in the past decade due to their potential for application in soft robotics [1,2,3,4], bioelectronics [5,6,7], wearable [8,9,10] and conformal electronics [11,12,13,14]. Liquid metal spontaneously forms a thin passivating oxide layer (~3 nm) on the surface in the presence of oxygen, which promotes adhesion to various substrates [16]. Liquid metal has been utilized to form a polymer-metal composite by dispersing the liquid metal particles into polymeric network [20,21,22,23,24,25,26]. The small particles of the liquid metal can prevent coalescence due to the thin oxide layer on the particles [26], the oxide layer can lead to poor dispersion of the metal in the polymer. It is necessary to modify the oxide outer layer to obtain fluidic liquid metal-based composites [27,28,29]
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